[add-sub-mul-div]

Merit is one of those things that helps in the long run but can't be guaranteed to help at any one specific time. So you need to trust it even when it seems unhelpful.

But on the other hand, software dev seems to be racing in the direction of replacing developers with fungible AI operators. It's too soon to tell how it will end, but whatever labor can replaced or reduced will be. A long-standing equilibrium of labor is gone.